Trust is the connecting fabric upon which innovation and business success are built according to McKinsey and Company, Harvard Business Review, Forrester Research and many other reputable organizations.  In fact, when trust levels are high, businesses tend to grow faster, exhibiting the strong connection between trust and prosperity.

You might not think that trust-building is important for small to medium-sized businesses (SMBs), but it is critical if you want to achieve your business objectives and keep your employees and customers satisfied. While you might not expect a technology company like ours to discuss trust, we care about your business objectives and believe it is essential for your people, processes and technology.

Building trust is essential for any organization, whether it’s a startup or a Fortune 500 company. It gives employees the confidence to take chances and innovate, gives customers the confidence to buy from and collaborate with you, and gives partners the confidence to do business with you. But how do you create a foundation for trust?

Leverage Processes and Technology

Building trust is a marathon not a sprint. It takes time, effort, and consistency to build a strong trusting foundation. There are a things companies can do to succeed.

Integrate Technologies

Integrating technologies that work well together can make all the difference to an organization’s organizational efficiency and success. When done properly, it will save time, reduce errors, and minimize friction within the company. Inefficient and incompatible technologies can create chaos, confusion, slow down work flows, damage productivity and create unsatisfying work environment.

Invest in integrating the right technologies for your business which can lead to improved productivity, better quality, and a less stressful work environment. Having a reliable foundation is a building block to having trust in an organization.

Implement Thoughtful Processes

Thoughtful processes that consider the user experience can reduce confusion and opportunities for conflict that make it easier for an employee to work for you. When an individual’s expectations are not met, conflict arises, which lead employees to shift responsibility and blame, lowering productivity and overall job satisfaction.

Thought processes can help ensure that everyone’s expectations are met, minimizing the chances of conflict. It can create a more stable process with consistency. People have trust when expectations are consistently met.

Data Security

Customers and employees are quick to lose trust in organizations that do not protect their sensitive data. Having measures in place that protect customers and employee data is one way to build trust. It not only protects them, but your bottom line, as a data breach can be costly to recover from, not to mention the PR nightmare. Many small to medium-size businesses (SMBs) do not recover from such attacks. Since the Pandemic, cyberattacks have been on the rise, and the increase is likely to follow for years to come.

It is well worth it to invest in securing your data. The more you have, the more of a target you will be. Build trust while protecting data.

Choosing the Right Partner

Since trust-building can be so challenging for SMBs to handle alone, collaborating with a managed service provider (MSP) like us is the best option. MSPs can help with tasks such as disaster recovery, compliance, security and much more. Working with an MSP such as us will allow you to concentrate on your core competencies, safe in the knowledge that your customers’ data is secure.

To dig deeper, download our Infographic!